'Strong women', in Star Wars and otherwise
Dec. 1st, 2003 06:54 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
owlI was browsing Livejournals at the weekend, and came across this post on ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
maidenjedi's LJ.
Basically it asked for discussion on the female characters in Star Wars, and were they 'strong women'. In the comments, as well as poor opinions of the Prequel Trilogy and Lucas' film-making, there were comments such as:
What really got to me was that there was no need to introduce Beru like that. She's introduced as "my girlfriend Beru", has one line ("hello"), and she's, like, serving them blue milk! WTF?! She doesn't even live with these people!
I wonder if Beru's subjugation isn't part of Tatooine culture. It would have been interesting to see how Shmi Skywalker responded to and interacted with Clegg Lars.
Of course, the way Beru was introduced really fit with Owen's personality, which is/was domineering, short-sighted, and not a little xenophobic, IMHO. It doesn't excuse Beru's "little woman" portrayal, though.
So Beru is condemned on 30 seconds of screentime! Her character is ruined for ever because she, gasp, serves a drink to visitors who are probably tired and thirsty and are about to hear some very bad news The Larses have just been bereaved, remeber, and Cliegg lost his leg. It makes sense she'd be around to help out. Beru as far as we can tell is nurturing and feelings-orientated(F, in Myers-Briggs typology, maybe even NF). It makes perfect sense that she was the one who thought to get drinks, rather than the T Owen.
She's a frontier woman, she's married to a farmer. She's not some Stepford wife! I'm from a farming community myself, and whatever farmer's wives may be, they are not passive and spineless as a rule. Generally, as well as cooking, cleaning and child-rearing, they either hold down an outside job to supplement the farm income, or work as an unpaid farm worker (Not the very heaviest jobs, which physically a woman wouldn't be capable off, specially if she's childbearing, breast feeding or got a toddler in tow, but I have known farmer's wives keep the hens, drive tractors during silage-drawing, hand-rear lambs, feed calves, help with the milking, get up in the middle of the night during calving, as well as catering for vets, employees and contractors.) It's not an easy job, and it's just as important as the farmer's itself.
I have a great fondness for Owen and Beru. They are under-rated, maligned, ignored and ill-characterised by the fandom at large. We don't see much of them onscreen, but we do see their life's work, so to speak: Luke Skywalker. He is emotionally stable (consider what he goes through in the OT and still retains sanity and humanity), loving and compassionate to a fault, humble, unselfish, and is willing to sacrifice himself for his family. Tell me how someone could grow up like that without having been loved, and loved well.
Leia got off a little better, but:
Leia post-RotJ (and even, I think, to a great extent in RotJ) is pretty soft as well.
Leia very quickly loses her rough edges, becomes scarily domesticated by Ep VI. And for me the disconcerting thing - even as a kid - was that while she is Anakin's offspring as much as Luke is, she's never really brought into the whole destiny thing.
And watch as the entire point Leia's character arc in the OT is missed. She and Han were in ANH both cut off from love in differnet ways; Han by his selfishness, Leia by her idealism and single focus on the rebel cause. They grow together during the trilogy.
Padmé got off badly too, due to having the misfortune to fall in love with a future Sith Lord. The black corset affair was much debated, but as I don't have a baldy what Padmé was playing at by wearing it, I shall leave that issue alone.
As for the EU:
I haven't read any Star Wars books, but I've played a lot of the video games. Women in those seem to always be "fighters" of some type, fighting alongside your character or others. Jedi Knight has female Jedis fighting with you, which is pretty cool. Episode II showed that women are bounty hunters/assasins just like men.
Mara Jade was phenomenally strong is most of the books I'd read, and I remain a fan. Can't speak to her NJO incarnation, but I do think she was one of the best done female characters in the EU. She worked especially well due to her independence from *any* of the organizations.
Oh, spare us. I don't consider Mara Jade a strong woman at all. Emotionally, she's brittle. Perhaps that looks superficially like strong to some, including the attitude from hell. She has no 'feminine' characteritics whatsoever. Someone propsed the fact that Zahn was writing her as a male substitute, to allow him to have Luke in a slash relationship without having Lucasfilm kill him, and I have to say it makes sense. She's certainly the dominating partner in the LEUke/Mara marriage.
As for the 'fighters': Why can a woman only be considered 'strong' if she's exactly like the stereotype of a man? That's just as demeaning as keeping her barefoot in the kitchen. There is nothing wrong with being able to take care of yourself, it's positive, but why is it considered 'weak' to have stereotypically female characteristics like caring for one's family, having a nurturing personality, even being able to cook? I think that all human beings should have both 'masculine' and 'feminine' characteristics to some degree. The macho macho macho man and the giggling inept female are both incomplete charicatures of humanity. I find it odd that certain feminists, while despising men, attempt to make women into the image of a man.
*uses ironically appropriate 'nice men' icon*
maidenjedi's LJ.Basically it asked for discussion on the female characters in Star Wars, and were they 'strong women'. In the comments, as well as poor opinions of the Prequel Trilogy and Lucas' film-making, there were comments such as:
What really got to me was that there was no need to introduce Beru like that. She's introduced as "my girlfriend Beru", has one line ("hello"), and she's, like, serving them blue milk! WTF?! She doesn't even live with these people!
I wonder if Beru's subjugation isn't part of Tatooine culture. It would have been interesting to see how Shmi Skywalker responded to and interacted with Clegg Lars.
Of course, the way Beru was introduced really fit with Owen's personality, which is/was domineering, short-sighted, and not a little xenophobic, IMHO. It doesn't excuse Beru's "little woman" portrayal, though.
So Beru is condemned on 30 seconds of screentime! Her character is ruined for ever because she, gasp, serves a drink to visitors who are probably tired and thirsty and are about to hear some very bad news The Larses have just been bereaved, remeber, and Cliegg lost his leg. It makes sense she'd be around to help out. Beru as far as we can tell is nurturing and feelings-orientated(F, in Myers-Briggs typology, maybe even NF). It makes perfect sense that she was the one who thought to get drinks, rather than the T Owen.
She's a frontier woman, she's married to a farmer. She's not some Stepford wife! I'm from a farming community myself, and whatever farmer's wives may be, they are not passive and spineless as a rule. Generally, as well as cooking, cleaning and child-rearing, they either hold down an outside job to supplement the farm income, or work as an unpaid farm worker (Not the very heaviest jobs, which physically a woman wouldn't be capable off, specially if she's childbearing, breast feeding or got a toddler in tow, but I have known farmer's wives keep the hens, drive tractors during silage-drawing, hand-rear lambs, feed calves, help with the milking, get up in the middle of the night during calving, as well as catering for vets, employees and contractors.) It's not an easy job, and it's just as important as the farmer's itself.
I have a great fondness for Owen and Beru. They are under-rated, maligned, ignored and ill-characterised by the fandom at large. We don't see much of them onscreen, but we do see their life's work, so to speak: Luke Skywalker. He is emotionally stable (consider what he goes through in the OT and still retains sanity and humanity), loving and compassionate to a fault, humble, unselfish, and is willing to sacrifice himself for his family. Tell me how someone could grow up like that without having been loved, and loved well.
Leia got off a little better, but:
Leia post-RotJ (and even, I think, to a great extent in RotJ) is pretty soft as well.
Leia very quickly loses her rough edges, becomes scarily domesticated by Ep VI. And for me the disconcerting thing - even as a kid - was that while she is Anakin's offspring as much as Luke is, she's never really brought into the whole destiny thing.
And watch as the entire point Leia's character arc in the OT is missed. She and Han were in ANH both cut off from love in differnet ways; Han by his selfishness, Leia by her idealism and single focus on the rebel cause. They grow together during the trilogy.
Padmé got off badly too, due to having the misfortune to fall in love with a future Sith Lord. The black corset affair was much debated, but as I don't have a baldy what Padmé was playing at by wearing it, I shall leave that issue alone.
As for the EU:
I haven't read any Star Wars books, but I've played a lot of the video games. Women in those seem to always be "fighters" of some type, fighting alongside your character or others. Jedi Knight has female Jedis fighting with you, which is pretty cool. Episode II showed that women are bounty hunters/assasins just like men.
Mara Jade was phenomenally strong is most of the books I'd read, and I remain a fan. Can't speak to her NJO incarnation, but I do think she was one of the best done female characters in the EU. She worked especially well due to her independence from *any* of the organizations.
Oh, spare us. I don't consider Mara Jade a strong woman at all. Emotionally, she's brittle. Perhaps that looks superficially like strong to some, including the attitude from hell. She has no 'feminine' characteritics whatsoever. Someone propsed the fact that Zahn was writing her as a male substitute, to allow him to have Luke in a slash relationship without having Lucasfilm kill him, and I have to say it makes sense. She's certainly the dominating partner in the LEUke/Mara marriage.
As for the 'fighters': Why can a woman only be considered 'strong' if she's exactly like the stereotype of a man? That's just as demeaning as keeping her barefoot in the kitchen. There is nothing wrong with being able to take care of yourself, it's positive, but why is it considered 'weak' to have stereotypically female characteristics like caring for one's family, having a nurturing personality, even being able to cook? I think that all human beings should have both 'masculine' and 'feminine' characteristics to some degree. The macho macho macho man and the giggling inept female are both incomplete charicatures of humanity. I find it odd that certain feminists, while despising men, attempt to make women into the image of a man.
*uses ironically appropriate 'nice men' icon*
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2003-12-01 04:57 pm (UTC)On the other hand, as far as Mara goes I consider her a wildly damaged woman in the original Zahn trilogy who eventually gets over her issues. Is she not particularly nurturing? Yeah. Is she domineering (not that I consider that unfeminine)? Yeah. Does that make her not feminine? Meh. I don't really know and I don't really care. Why? Because she doesn't exist in a vacuum. Within the Zahn books there are also Leia, Mon Mothma, and Winter (as well as that smuggler whose name I forget) - who are show differing forms of strength.
So perhaps you see Mara as unfeminine. If that were the only model of "female" strength given out by Zahn I would probably be offended by her, too. However, she isn't. She's not a female herione. She's just a character, and her characterization - given what she has been through - makes sense to me. She copes with a lot of trauma, a lot of darkness, and comes through an ally. That makes her strong in my book. We already established that she's a woman (on account of the pronouns ;)). Boom. Strong woman.
no subject
Date: 2003-12-02 06:56 am (UTC)Besides, 'meek' is not synonymous with 'weak'. Jesus Christ was meek, and no one could accuse him of being weak-willed.